AFTER his fiancee told him that she has lost love for him, a 29-year-old man of Chawama has sued her mother to refund him the bride price he paid her. Solo Yamalezi told the Chawama local court that he wants Rhoidah Nakazwe, 40, mother of Naomi Namusukuma, his former fiancée, to give him back the K3,700 he paid out of K8,000 which was charged.

A visibly disappointed Yamalezi told the court he was shocked to be told by Naomi that she had lost interest in him a few months before their wedding. “I knew Naomi in 2015 and I engaged her in 2016. I made my intentions known to her family and they charged me K8,000 for dowry. I paid K3,700 as upfront payment, after which we started preparations for our marriage,” he said. Yamalezi told the court that his fiancée, with time, changed and started giving him excuses which caused him to have suspicions.

He told the court that he found out that Namusukuma was seeing another man and this contributed to the breakdown of their relationship. “My fiancee started showing a sad face whenever I visited her. She would escort me within five minutes each time I went to her place on the pretext that she is busy. “One time she openly told me that she had lost the love she had for me and nothing can be done to bring it back,” Yamalezi said. He said he did a lot for Namusukuma’s family and wondered that she paid his kindness towards her and the family with evil. But Nakazwe told the court that she would not refund Yamalezi his money because he wasted her daughter’s time.

“In the first place, I don’t understand why Yamalezi has brought me to court instead of my daughter. Yes, we got the money as a family but I don’t know what happened between them,” she said. And Namusukuma told the court she lost interest in Yamalezi because he was insulting her family each time they quarrelled. In passing judgment, Magistrate Ruth Masanga, sitting with Magistrate Nancy Ngoma, ordered Nakazwe to refund Yamalezi his money because he did not marry her daughter.